Faculty Perceptions of Academic Freedom at a Private Religious University

Academic freedom is viewed by many in higher education as an indispensible foundational principle offering protection to university faculty. University faculty working within schools of education rely on the protection of academic freedom to pursue and develop new knowledge, frameworks, and pedagogies with which they can train and equip the next generation of classroom teachers and school administrators. Private religious universities have been a part of the American education landscape since the founding of Harvard University, yet the perception exists that faculty at religious universities are de facto inhibited by the religious commitment of many of these institutions. This study examines the concept of academic freedom as viewed by 18 senior faculty at Regent University, a private religious institution. Findings demonstrate faculty generally support an institutional perspective of academic freedom and express a high level of comfort with limited restrictions on academic freedom in light of the university’s religious mission. Implications exist for all faculty, especially those at religious institutions

The Export Performance Of Manufacturing Firms In Developing Countries: A Jamaican Study

There is a great deal of published research on the economic factors and policies which influence the export performance, in manufactured products, of developing countries. Yet, for these countries, there are few systematic reports which illustrate how these factors and policies affect the manager of individual manufacturing firms. Also, there are few reports which attempt to explain the differential export performance of these enterprises, both from the point of view of the firm and of the manager. The objective of this study, therefore, was to identify and assess the relationship between the firm\u27s export behaviour and the characteristics of the firm, its managers and their perceptions of the domestic and foreign environments.;With a conceptual model as a framework, data for this research was collected in Jamaica. One hundred and nineteen firms were interviewed, including forty non-exporters. Each interview lasted approximately two hours. The data was analyzed using Discriminant Analysis and Multiple Regression.;The results indicated that the factors which distinguished the exporting from the non-exporting firm were substantially different from the factors which determined export performance. The results also indicated that the managerial characteristics associated with exporting firms were those which have traditionally been linked with innovators. Also important was the finding that firms established during a regime of import substitution were poor export performers. On the basis of the reseach results a revised conceptual model was developed.;The study concluded that managerial characteristics were important, if a firm wished to enter the export market, but that the resources of the enterprise were the key to export performance. These resources center on the technical superiority of the firm and on its product. It was also concluded that the governing authorities in developing countries should not expect firms established during a regime of import substitution to be significant exporters. And finally, because of the importance of the domestic environment, it was also concluded that managers and public policy makers need to develop a close working relationship if manufactured exports are to be encouraged

Faculty Perceptions of Academic Freedom at a Private Religious University

Academic freedom is viewed by many in higher education as an indispensable foundational principle offering protection to university faculty. University faculty working within schools of education rely on the protection of academic freedom to pursue and develop new knowledge, frameworks, and pedagogies with which they can train and equip the next generation of classroom teachers and school administrators. Private religious universities have been a part of the American education landscape since the founding of Harvard University, yet the perception exists that faculty at religious universities are de facto inhibited by the religious commitment of many of these institutions. This study examines the concept of academic freedom as viewed by 18 senior faculty at Regent University, a private religious institution. Findings demonstrate faculty generally support an institutional perspective of academic freedom and express a high level of comfort with limited restrictions on academic freedom in light of the university’s religious mission. Implications exist for all faculty, especially those at religious institutions

Directions of seismic anisotropy in laboratory models of mantle plumes

A recent expansion in global seismic anisotropy data provides important new insights about the style of mantle convection. Interpretations of these geophysical measurements rely on complex relationships between mineral physics, seismology, and mantle dyn

How often are male mosquitoes attracted to humans?

Many mosquito species live close to humans where females feed on human blood. While male mosquitoes do not feed on blood, it has long been recognized that males of some species can be attracted to human hosts. To investigate the frequency of male mosquito attraction to humans, we conducted a literature review and human-baited field trials, as well as laboratory experiments involving males and females of three common Aedes species. Our literature review indicated that male attraction to humans is limited to a small number of species, including Ae. aegypti and Ae. albopictus. In our human-baited field collections, only 4 out of 13 species captured included males. In laboratory experiments, we found that male Ae. notoscriptus and Ae. vigilax showed no attraction to humans, while male Ae. aegypti exhibited persistent attraction for up to 30 min. Both male and female Ae. aegypti displayed similar preferences for different human subjects, suggesting that male Ae. aegypti respond to similar cues as females. Additionally, we found that mosquito repellents applied to human skin effectively repelled male mosquitoes. These findings shed light on mosquito behaviour and have implications for mosquito control programmes, particularly those involving the release or monitoring of the male mosquito population

Reprocessing of Soft X-ray Emission Lines in Black Hole Accretion Disks

By means of a Monte Carlo code that accounts for Compton scattering and photoabsorption followed by recombination, we have investigated the radiation transfer of Ly alpha, He alpha, and recombination continua photons of H- and He-like C, N, O, and Ne produced in the photoionized atmosphere of a relativistic black hole accretion disk. We find that photoelectric opacity causes significant attenuation of photons with energies above the O VIII K-edge; that the conversion efficiencies of these photons into lower-energy lines and recombination continua are high; and that accounting for this reprocessing significantly (by factors of 21% to 105%) increases the flux of the Ly alpha and He alpha emission lines of H- and He-like C and O escaping the disk atmosphere.Comment: 4 pages including 4 encapsulated postscript figures; LaTeX format, uses aastex.cls and emulateapj5.sty; accepted on 2004 January 13 for publication in The Astrophysical Journa

Planar chiral palladacycle precatalysts for asymmetric synthesis

Chiral non-racemic palladacycles were employed as precatalysts for Pd(0) mediated asymmetric synthesis. Addition of HPAr2/base to a ferrocenyloxazoline planar chiral palladacycle resulted in ligand synthesis and palladium capture to give a bidentate Phosferrox/Pd(0) complex. A series of these complexes were generated in situ and applied successfully as catalysts for asymmetric allylic alkylation

Enantiopure planar chiral and chiral-at-metal iridacycles derived from bulky cobalt sandwich complexes

Reaction of (η5-(S)-2-(4-methylethyl)oxazolinylcyclopentadienyl)(η4-tetraphenylcyclobutadiene)cobalt with [IrCp*Cl2]2 in acetonitrile with KPF6 and KOt-Bu resulted in S,Sp,SIr and S,Rp,RIr configured acetonitrile and Cp* coordinated cationic iridacycles (d.r. up to 4.8 : 1 – kinetic control), the planar chiral configuration dictating the configuration of the pseudo-tetrahedral iridium-based stereogenic centre. Addition of water to the cycloiridation reaction resulted in an increase in yield (up to 78%) at the cost of diastereoselectivity. Use of the corresponding substrate containing a t-Bu rather than an i-Pr substituted oxazoline gave exclusively the S,Sp,SIr diastereoisomer, and under the same conditions (S)-2-ferrocenyl- 4-(1,1-dimethylethyl)oxazoline cycloiridated to give only the S,Sp,SIr diastereoisomer. Substitution reactions of the title complexes at iridium proceeded with retention of configuration, a computational study revealing the proposed coordinatively unsaturated intermediate of a dissociative mechanism to display a relatively weak Co-Ir interaction, and a pronounced steric effect as the basis of stereocontrol